A green gem in the East Central Illinois region is the new Renewable Energy Center at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, Illinois. Switching from a coal-fired power plant, the new biomass-burning facility is a clear environmental improvement with an expected 80 percent reduction in net greenhouse gas emissions. This virtual tour shares many more details of […]

Every Earth Day, as part of our Energy Saving category here at 404 Tech Support, we compile some of the green tech-related news (2009, 2010, 2011). In 2012, it seems like a lot of companies are pushing their green news in this week leading up to Earth Day. In no particular order, here’s a selection […]

Public Act 097-0287 went into effect January 1st, 2012 for the state of Illinois. It updated the Illinois Products Recycling and Reuse Act to cover seventeen electronic products that must be recycled. It also introduced a number of mandates, fees, and deadlines for manufacturers that sell electronics in Illinois (such as recycling 40% of previous […]

I picked up my first UPS several years ago as one of the deal items at a Black Friday doorbuster sale. I used it as a battery backup on my PC for several years. Since then, I’ve upgraded to higher wattage uninterruptible power supplies to support more electronics and have more time in the case […]

I passed by this book on display at my local library a few times before I actually picked up 62 Projects to Make with a Dead Computer and I initially picked it up as a skeptic. From the first time I saw the cover of the book, I kept thinking “what about the heavy metals or […]

HP is holding a showcase technology event this week in Las Vegas, Discover 2011, that combines several previous customer events. It promises to bring together the people, technology, and ideas to solve the difficult enterprise challenges. (more…)

Happy Earth Day 2011! I was hoping to add solar panels to my home this Spring but the local vendor never got back to me. After crunching some numbers, with current solar panel prices/efficiency, electricity usage, and incentive rebates I decided to put the extra money towards the mortgage as a wiser investment. I’ll be […]

Although not computer technology, the Evolve Ladybug showerhead is energy-saving, water-saving, and cost-saving technology, all of which are other interests of mine. The Ladybug is a three-inch long adapter that fits on the end of your shower pipe between the showerhead. It’s designed to turn your shower down to a trickle as soon as the […]

I hope you got everything that you wanted with Christmas yesterday but in case you got a TV, a computer, or pretty much any electronic, you might be pondering what to do with your old electronics that your new gifts will replace. You owe it to yourself and the world to listen to this report […]

We last checked in with Granola back in June where I wrote about this energy saving software. Today, there was an announcement made that showed two needed features amongst the other changes. The two features that top my list are the ability to deploy via Group Policy and it now runs as a service so […]

There’s a guest post with my name on it over at Freewaregenius. Today’s article is about Gazelle.com, a site that assists recycling your used gadgets. If they’re really old, Gazelle will ship you a box to return the gadget to them for proper disposal. If it has value, they’ll send you a quoted amount of […]